CHUTZPAH!
Lake Worth, Florida, homeowner Phil Fraumeni emerged from his house on July 19 to find a white Tesla not only parked on his lawn, but tethered to an outlet on his house, charging the car’s battery. Fraumeni told WPBF he waited a couple of hours, then called police. The car was not stolen, and police were able to contact the owner, who showed up around noon and told Fraumeni he had been visiting friends in the neighborhood when the battery died around midnight. Fraumeni declined to press charges (pun intended) and did not ask for reimbursement for the 12 hours of electricity the car used.
T(WINNING)
Keep up with us here: On Aug. 1, identical twin brothers Andy and Chad Baker of Nashville, Tennessee, were on their way to the annual Twins Day Festival in Twinsburg, Ohio, in their identical blue Tesla Model 3s, when an Ohio state trooper pulled them both over for having identical license plates, reading “SUBJ TO.” The brothers patiently explained to the officer that the plates are, in fact, different: In one, “TO” is spelled with a zero, and in the other, it’s spelled with a capital O. “Nobody likes getting pulled over by police; we were both nervous, but it’s a great story and we will tell it all weekend,” Andy told Fox8.
CAN’T BEAT THE HEAT
Two men in Antwerp, Belgium, felt the heat on July 24 when they accidentally got locked in a shipping container full of cocaine in the huge port there, reported AFP. That day, temperatures reached a record high of 104 degrees Fahrenheit, stifling the 24- and 25-year-old, who had entered the container “to remove drugs,” according to prosecutors. As the mercury rose, they desperately called a police emergency number and when police finally found them two hours later, they gratefully gave themselves up. Port workers were videoed pouring water over the pair to try to lower their body temperatures.
GOING TO EXTREMES
Kim Gordon, 55, vanished on Feb. 25, according to his 17-year-old son, after going for a nighttime swim at Monastery Beach in Monterey, California, an area with a deadly reputation sometimes called “Mortuary Beach.” The Associated Press reported that police searched for three days before learning the Scotsman from Edinburgh, also known as Kim Vincent Avis, faced 24 charges of rape in Scotland, which made them suspicious about the story. “When that came up, we start to wonder if this is a hoax,” said Monterey County sheriff’s Capt. John Thornburg. Finally, on July 26, the U.S. Marshals Service announced it had caught up with Gordon in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where he is now being held; the son had been returned to Scotland and will not be charged with filing a false report.
WAIT, WHAT?
In a product expansion move that inspires one to shout, “Stay in your lane!” Oscar Meyer announced on Aug. 1 that it is entering the dessert category with the Ice Dog Sandwich – an ice cream sandwich with cookie “buns” surrounding bits of candied hot dog meat and spicy mustard ice cream. United Press International reported that the company partnered with a New York ice cream company to create the confectionary treat. BONUS: French’s announced the day before the creation of its own mustard-flavored ice cream together with Coolhaus.
LEAST COMPETENT CRIMINAL
Police in Sydney, Australia, had a drug bust land in their laps on July 22, when an unnamed man slammed a van loaded with 600 pounds of methamphetamines into a patrol car parked outside a suburban police station. The car was empty at the time of the collision, Reuters reported. The van sped away from the scene, but police caught up with the 28-year-old driver an hour later and charged him with drug supply and negligent driving. The drugs had an estimated street value of about $140 million.
TELLING ON YOURSELF
Michael Harrell, 54, strolled into a U.S. Bank in Cleveland on July 29 with a note demanding cash from a teller: “This is a robbery. Don’t get nobody hurt.” Unfortunately, according to WJW, he wrote the note on a document he had apparently received from the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles, which included his full name and address. The teller, who called Harrell by his first name after seeing it on the letter, gave him $206 and summoned police, who later arrested him.
FORCE OF NATURE
As a storm rolled through Port Charlotte, Florida, on Aug. 4, Marylou Ward and her husband got an explosive surprise. Ward said she heard a “boom” that was the loudest noise she’d ever heard. “We smelled smoke and I looked outside,” she told WINK News. Smoke was coming from her septic tank, but it was the indoor effect that really shocked them: Her master bedroom toilet was in hundreds of pieces. A plumber explained that a nearby lightning strike ignited methane gas that had built up in the pipes and septic tank, destroying not only the tank and the toilet, but the indoor plumbing as well. Fortunately, no one was hurt: “I’m just glad none of us were on the toilet,” Ward said.
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